Brenden Cutright helped Weston Ranch build some momentum in its match with Kimball. The Cougars outlasted the Jaguars for the final spot in the Sac-Joaquin Section Team Duals.

JAGADA CHAMBERS/Bulletin File Photo

Senior wrestlers in the Valley Oak League must have night terrors about wild horses.

The Oakdale Mustangs have dominated the conference championship tournament with an incredible 36 (out of a possible 42) bracket finalists since 2011 and own rights to 28 VOL titles across that span. The rest of the conference combined for only half of that.

At a stage of the postseason where only four individuals move on to the next week, the presence of a program on the cusp of 13 Sac-Joaquin Section banners in seven years is about as welcome as a silverback gorilla at a tea party.

Oakdale wrestlers will batter the 14 brackets with high seeds in nearly every weight class as conference teams vie for Division IV qualifications at Kimball on Saturday.

Oakdale has qualified an entire lineup to the D-IV Championships for two straight years. If it happens Saturday, the seven remaining league teams are again left with only three remaining seeds to fight for.

And it won’t be easy.

The VOL sports 22 wrestlers ranked with the best in the section, according to the California Wrestling Newsletter, and another handful that should be listed among them.

Consider this: at divisionals, the VOL, Western Athletic Conference and Sierra Valley League will send only four wrestlers in each weight to Masters. Last year, the VOL had four more Masters qualifiers than a WAC conference that includes perennial strengths Los Banos and Central Catholic and 13 more than a lackluster SVC that has never won a Division IV banner.

It’s obvious that a divisional qualification from the VOL is the most difficult rout available, while some SVC wrestlers will treat their conference finale like a walk that awards cakes.

With that in mind, let’s eyeball the brackets of the upcoming VOL Championships and pick top-three finishers for each weight. I’ll leave the fourth berths to divisionals up to your own speculation.

126 — The toughest weight at the league tourney will represent a gauntlet of matches and a stacked lineup to advance to divisionals. In the end, Max Stevens of Oakdale beats William Fishburn of Sierra for first while Peter Barrington of East Union ends third.

132 — The most anticipated finale could go either way, but Oakdale’s Jake Jacobson has wrestled far tougher competition than Kimball’s Trent Nicholson, so I will give him the edge. Colton Masters of Sonora is third.